INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. – Penn State redshirt senior Brad Pataky of Clearfield will end his college wrestling career in the 2011 NCAA Division I Championships after all.
The Nittany Lion 125-pounder was one of 50 at-large selections announced Wednesday to complete the 33-man brackets. Pataky will join seven teammates in the Wells Fargo Center at Philadelphia next week.
To make its picks revealed with the release of the brackets during a webcast from the NCAA Hall of Fame studio, the NCAA Division I Wrestling Committee utilized, in no particular order, head-to-head competition, qualifying event placement, quality wins, results against common opponents, winning percentage, rating percentage index, coaches’ ranking and number of matches contested at that weight class.
Sidelined twice during the regular season because of a knee injury, Pataky went into last weekend’s Big 10 Conference Championships with only 11 bouts under his belt.
He was seeded fourth but failed to nail down one of the Big 10’s five automatic qualifier berths, finishing seventh.
However, he was consistently ranked in or near the top 10 by InterMat, Amateur Wrestling News and Wrestling Insider Newsmagazine when he was competing.
So, Pataky will have only an 11-5 record for his third appearance at nationals, falling one win short of All-America honors a year ago.
His first-round bout next Thursday morning will be against a familiar foe, No. 12 seed Jarrod Garnett (28-7) of Virginia Tech.
Last season, Pataky was ranked No. 6 when Garnett pinned him in the finals of the Nittany Lion Open.
Pataky gained a measure of revenge a month later with a 12-6 decision at the Virginia Duals.
Garnett, a junior, is a two-time Atlantic Coast Conference champ with a 92-22 career record.
Win or lose, Pataky will get either No. 5 seed Zach Sanders (29-4) of Minnesota or Jason Lara (20-9) of Oregon State in his next match that night.
Sanders is a two-time All-American who placed third in the Big 10 tourney for the second year in a row. The redshirt junior owns a 97-21 career mark, including a 6-4 win over Lara in the fourth round of wrestlebacks last March.
Lara has been the Pac-10 Conference runner-up the last two seasons.
Big 10 champ Matt McDonough (23-1) of Iowa is the defending champion but is seeded behind No. 1 Anthony Robles (31-0) of Arizona State.
Big 10 runner-up Brandon Precin (30-2) of Northwestern is No. 3 and James Nicholson (31-0) of Old Dominion is No. 4.
Penn State has two wrestlers seeded second, two-time All-American Frank Molinaro at 149 and Ed Ruth at 174, and two seeded third, Andrew Long at 133 and David Taylor at 157.
All four won Big 10 titles, as did Quentin Wright, who is seeded No. 9 at 184.
Andrew Alton rated a No. 6 seed at 141 while Cameron Wade received the No. 9 seed at heavyweight.
Wright (Bald Eagle Area) and Alton (Central Mountain) are former District 6 standouts who were two-time PIAA Class AAA gold medalists.
The eight qualifiers are the most for Penn State since 2006.
